Interrogating Embodiment
CentreLGS Research Workshop
24-25th November 2006, University of Kent
Senate Chamber, University of Kent, Canterbury.
Information about travel to the University of Kent
and a map of the campus can be found on the CentreLGS
Kent Local Information page.
Embodiment has become a central focus of critical
work on health care and bioethical issues. As new technological
interventions make bodily change more possible, debate
rages about the ethics and legality of different kinds
of procedures from genetic selection to xeno-transplantation.
Embodied experiences - pain, pleasure, tiredness or
energy - have long been a motivation and guide for
medical
treatment. Embodied differences – from issues
of sex and reproduction to those of species and ability
– have been used to limit the scope of healthcare.
By interrogating the ways in which law (broadly understood)
responds to, mediates and initiates different kinds
of bodily intervention, this CentreLGS health care
and
bioethics research cluster assesses key trends in the
evolution of legal embodiment, and evaluates their
significance
for intersectional gender and sexuality.
Building on last year’s ‘Engendering
Bioethics’, this second research workshop, ‘Interrogating
Embodiment’,
will provide an opportunity for CLGS members and associates
to consider afresh the normative basis of bodily regulation.
The workshop will also provide an opportunity to flesh
out the contextual factors that limit the imagination
in the field of health care law and ethics. How can
we maximise the impact of critical perspectives in
a
cultural and political context which is often indifferent
if not hostile? In particular, we seek to identify
theoretical
and practical resources for assessing how the relationship
between embodiment, harm and choice has developed under
Blair’s regime in the UK, and for contextualising
these developments in terms of international trends.
The workshop will do this by asking participants to
address such questions as:
